u.s. couldn't take a hit. as far as what else is propelling stocks higher, mergers and acquisitions going on, media, even in the office services area, office depot, office max, possibly talking about a tie-up themselves. that is certainly giving some momentum to stocks and giving investors a little bit of oo mph to buy into the stock. who knows if it will stick. >> alison, thank you. >> sure. >>> thank you for keeping me company here at cnn as i was in for brooke baldwin. i want to take you to "the situation room" with wolf blitzer because he starts right now. and let's take a look at the "closing bell." you heard alison kosik say we're not going to hit the 14,164 today but we there is a lot going on in washington with the sequester and we have to hope that we are going to be seeing these kinds of numbers, wolf. we certainly hope it for a long time. but depending on what -- depending on what washington does, we'll have to see if it sticks. wolf blitzer? >>> thanks very much. happening now,